Page 51 of Mutant Mine

I smile. “No. Have you?”

“I don’t know… We made our own blackberry wine one fall. It wasstrong, but I don’t know if it wasgood. We drank it in the garden, and my friend threw up in the wishing well.”

“Perhaps it would be best if you did not open the wine.”

Rory laughs. She takes down two long-stemmed glasses.

We sit at the table and eat our food. The wine is good — tome, at least.

While we eat, we look out at the stars. There are a great many of them. We do not talk much, but that is natural. We have talked a lot today.

Rory sits back in her chair and rests her hands on her stomach. She is glowing from the wine, and perhaps still from the bath.

“Mm,” she says. “I’m stuffed.”

It is a simple thing, sharing a meal with her, and witnessing her contentment at being warm and fed. But simple joys are the ones you miss the most when they are gone — and the hardest to find your way back to.

“Rory,” I say. She looks up at me expectantly.

Perhaps the wine has loosened my tongue. I suddenly want her to understand how I see her — not just who I would kill for her. But now that I have started speaking, I do not know what I mean to say.

“Out there, in front of the men, I must be strong and harsh,” I continue haltingly. “But coming back here, to you… Little bird. For me, these evenings are like your days in the garden.”

Something real, and beautiful.

Rory is looking at me with wide eyes.

“Roth…”

But I do not get to find out what she was going to say next. The voice of the computer interrupts:

“CAPTAIN, PLEASE REPORT TO THE FLIGHT DECK,” it says. “CAPTAIN, TO THE FLIGHT DECK.”

“Does it mean you?!” asks Rory.

I rise from the table and stride towards the door, Rory close behind me.

“Is something wrong?” She sounds alarmed. I wish I could reassure her and share my hopes, but…

“It could be. I will have to check the instruments.”

“Crap. Maybe we shouldn’t have drunk anything.”

We step through onto the flight deck.

“Woah,” says Rory.

I forgot that she has not been in here before. The door has always been available to her, but she has never ventured through. She was probably too afraid of me to follow me.

The flight deck is a semi-circular chamber made of metal and glass. Hundreds of small lights blink on the equipment that lines the walls. At the front of the room is a long, curved window — the largest on the whole ship. Arcing in front of it is the instrument panel, with controls glowing on its glass surface. The window is overlaid with displays, projecting the ship’s maintenance statistics, star charts, object detection, incoming messages, weapons status, and so on.

A glance at one of the displays tells me that there is not yet any sign of my brothers. They are not the reason for this alert. I will have to keep waiting.

Rory is gazing around her in awe. I remember my own first time on a starship flight deck. To the untrained eye, it is an incomprehensible wall of technology. Government flight decks in particular are rarely seen by civilians; much of this equipment is still highly classified.

One of the displays is flashing red. I head over to it and study the data.

“Do not worry,” I say to Rory. “It is alerting me that there is a small asteroid belt in our path, some distance away. I will make a minor adjustment to our course.”

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